How many oxymoron jokes can there be? A lot, I can assure you. One of the most common examples would be military intelligence , with the phrase amicable divorce close behind. My personal favorite has to be a phrase used over and over (and probably one of the first any of us ever heard): common sense . Rick Moran's AT blog entry on May 14 titled " IN Court Says No Right To Resist Illegal Police Entry To Your Home " does a great job illustrating the out-of-control nature of our judiciary. It seems that last Thursday, the Indiana...

A three-judge federal appeals panel comprised of two Obama nominees and a Clinton nominee will hear arguments later this morning in two lawsuits challenging the constitutionality of the national health care law. The makeup of the U.S. Fourth Circuit of Appeals panel is crucial, because in lower court rulings so far, Democratic judges have upheld the law while Republican judges have declared it unconstitutional. The judges on the panel will be Obama nominees James A. Wynn, Jr and Andre M. Davis, who will sit on the panel along with Clinton nominee Diana Gribbon Motz.

Elbridge Gerry said to his colleagues in the First Congress in 1789, "The people of America can never be safe, if...[the federal government has] a right to exercise the power of giving constructions to the constitution different from the original instrument." Interpreting the Constitution according to the original meaning of the provisions therein is today labeled as the philosophy of originalism. It is the only logical and legitimate method of Constitutional interpretation. Early American Constitutional scholar St. George Tucker wrote in 1803, "The advantages of a written constitution, considered as the original contract of society must immediately strike every reflecting...

It seems like only yesterday that progressives were warning us about “politicizing the judiciary.” That was after Iowa’s voters declined last November to retain three Supreme Court justices who had ruled to overturn the state’s marriage law. Today, after a feverish and expensive campaign by unions to remove conservative Wisconsin Supreme CourtJustice David Prosser, you’ll hear no such talk..... ....They reasoned, correctly, that flipping Justice Prosser’s seat to the liberal Ms. Kloppenburg could create a 4-3 liberal majority that could undo what Mr. Walker and the GOP legislature had wrought. The unions pulled out all stops,.....As with the unsavory behavior...

The federal judge who struck down California's gay marriage ban has confirmed longtime rumors that he's gay, but said his sexuality was irrelevant in deciding the landmark case. Speaking for the first time about the case since retiring from the bench in February, former Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker said he never considered recusing himself from deciding the constitutionality of Proposition 8 because of his sexual orientation, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.

In his dissent in Lawrence v. Texas (2003), the Supreme Court case that invalidated Texas’s sodomy law, Justice Antonin Scalia cites the 11th Circuit case of William v. Pryor (2001) which upheld Alabama’s prohibition on the sale of sex toys on the ground that “[t]he crafting and safeguarding of public morality…indisputably is a legitimate government interest under rational basis scrutiny.” Scalia lists this ruling as one of “[c]ountless judicial decisions and legislative enactments” that “have relied on the ancient proposition that a governing majority’s belief that certain sexual behavior is ‘immoral and unacceptable’ constitutes a rational basis for regulation.” He...

Green Lake, Wis. — On the frozen lip of sprawling Big Green Lake, local Republicans gathered in a small hotel ballroom this afternoon for their annual Lincoln Day dinner. Mark Slate, a 39 year-old candidate for county judge, was decked in a stovepipe hat, but the real attraction was state supreme-court justice David Prosser, who gave a rousing speech, urging conservatives to support him on Tuesday, when he faces JoAnne Kloppenburg, an environmental lawyer, at the polls. In his remarks, Prosser noted that the race has gone national. Union-friendly groups are pouring millions into the contest, hoping to tilt the...

THIBODAUX — Larry Luther didn’t see the Facebook post by a Terrebonne Parish child-support hearing officer about a barroom bouncer appearing before him who has 23 children and “too much time on his hands.” But people who read a Courier and Daily Comet story containing questions about the posting’s propriety had little trouble determining who the posting was about and called Luther to tell him. Now the 41-year-old grandfather says he is preparing to file a Louisiana Judiciary Commission complaint against the hearing officer, William Dunckelman. “I am waiting on the papers in the mail,” Luther said Friday night. “I...

Admittedly, the Egyptian uprising, the nullification of Obamacare and the ongoing ramifications of "Snowpocolypse 2011" could render the controversy about an MTV original program insignificant by comparison. After all, MTV is only out to destroy an entire generation. No big deal. Every adult - not just parents - should take the time to learn about the MTV show "Skins," a new "teen drama" that the Parents Television Council (PTC) has deemed "the most dangerous show on TV." Be careful when you go hunting for information about "Skins" lest your spouse conclude you've developed an interest in child pornography. The publicity...

Houston state trial judge Kevin Fine last year made big news when he declared the state’s death penalty unconstitutional, ruling that it violates due process protections “to execute innocent people.” (snip) But Fine later reversed course, deciding that he would rescind his ruling until he could hold a detailed hearing on the constitutionality of the death penalty. (snip) But the death penalty, it appears, is no longer on trial in Texas, after the state’s highest criminal court yesterday ordered Fine to dismiss Green’s death-penalty challenge, concluding the defendant had no grounds to raise a constitutional claim unless and until he...

WASHINGTON – Republicans and Democrats must find a long-term solution to selecting federal judges, Chief Justice John Roberts says, while blaming both sides for the political gridlock of judicial nominations in the Senate. "Each political party has found it easy to turn on a dime from decrying to defending the blocking of judicial nominations, depending on their changing political fortunes," Roberts said Friday in his year-end report. "This has created acute difficulties for some judicial districts. Sitting judges in those districts have been burdened with extraordinary caseloads." ---SNIP--- "I am heartened that the Senate recently filled a number of district...

Judicial Retention: Three judges in Iowa were disrobed on Tuesday for voting to end the state's ban on gay marriage. Even those who legislate from the bench would be wise not to ignore we the people. We've often complained about the power of unelected judges who, when not circumventing the U.S. Constitution and those of their respective states, are busy inventing new rights that often conflict with the will of the people, even after voters or their elected representatives have voted the opposite way. In some states, while voters may not get to pick the judges, they can vote to...

(CNSNews.com) – Catholic politicians who publicly support abortion or homosexual marriage and then seek to turn away from such “gravely sinful acts” must perform “public” actions of “repentance,” said Raymond Burke, the archbishop emeritus of St. Louis and the current head of the highest court at the Vatican, the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura. In remarks at the 5th Human Life International World Prayer Congress for Life in Rome, Italy, Arbp. Burke said that the culture today pushes a “cafeteria Catholicism,” whereby some Catholics pick and choose “what part of the deposit of faith to believe and practice.” As...

There aren’t a whole lot of things in politics about which anyone can claim: “This has never happened before!” But in Iowa, a major battle over judicial activism fits the bill. In all the years that Iowans have held to their odd, some would say cozy, system of appointing judges at all levels including the Supreme Court, a justice has never been voted off that court even though they all come up for a vote on a rotating basis. Each election cycle a few justices come up for retention, and in total they face the voters once every eight years....

Record spending on judicial elections around the country has prompted calls for changes from a broad array of advocates, including moderate conservatives such as retired Supreme Court justice Sandra Day O'Connor. But a report issued Thursday by a small conservative group active in judicial elections alleges that the efforts to change such elections amount to a campaign to bolster liberals, with backing from financier and philanthropist George Soros. The report from the American Justice Partnership alleges that Soros has spent millions on "a highly coordinated, well-funded campaign" to "fundamentally alter the composition of America's state courts." Some advocacy groups say...

When President Obama nominated Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court in May, we and many others reported out that she’d likely have to recuse herself from a handful of cases for the upcoming term. The reason: she was the Solicitor General for the U.S. So she’d be conflicted on a number of cases, having already served as an advocate on many of them.

WEBTODAY-- Since 1913 we have been transitioning to National Socialism and losing our freedoms bit by bit. Things are now so far gone that about the only difference between Democrats and Republicans is the rate of change. Full transition to National Socialism will be complete under the Democrats in about 10-15 years and under the Republicans in about 25-30 years. Paul Owen contends that the forces of destruction and corruption are so well entrenched you cannot fix the situation by simply throwing the "Bums" out. Throwing the "Bums" won't work because the "Bums" no longer run our country. Electing a...

Judge Robert Bork, whose nomination to the Supreme Court went down in flames in 1987 after contentious confirmation hearings, said for the first time today that he is opposed to Elena Kagan’s nomination to the Court. "Ms. Kagan has not had the time to develop a mature philosophy of judging," said Bork in a conference call organized by Americans United for Life. "It is typical of young lawyers going into constitutional law that they have inflated dreams of what constitutional law can do and what courts can do," Bork said. "That’s the danger of Ms. Kagan that she hasn’t had...

The ranking member on the House Judiciary Committee said Monday that he's studying options for investigating the Sestak affair if the administration does not responded to calls for an inquiry. Rep. Joe Sestak (D-Pa.) said Friday that former President Bill Clinton had conveyed an offer of an administration post if Sestak did not run against Sen. Arlen Specter for the Democratic Senate nomination. Sestak said he immediately brushed off the offer, and White House counsel Bob Bauer released a memo Friday saying "we have concluded that allegations of improper conduct rest on factual errors and lack a basis in the...

President Barack Obama has nominated Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology alumnus Robert Wilkins to a seat on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia in Washington, D.C. Wilkins, a 1986 chemical engineering graduate, is a former special litigation chief at the District of Columbia Public Defender Service, and a trial and appellate lawyer for the Venable LLP law firm. He specializes in corporate defense/white collar, technology and commercial litigation practice groups. Obama tapped Wilkins, a 1989 Harvard Law School alumnus, for an opening that was created when Judge James Robertson took senior status in 2008. The president also nominated...

WASHINGTON — A federal appeals court ruled on Friday that three men who have been detained by the United States military for years without trial in Afghanistan have no right to challenge their imprisonment in American courts. The ruling was a broad victory for the Obama administration in its efforts to hold terrorism suspects overseas for indefinite periods without judicial oversight. In a 26-page panel opinion reversing a lower court, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia unanimously ruled that three detainees at the military prison at Bagram air base have no right to hearings in...

The President Will Again Have To Consider A Complicated Political Calculus It didn't take President Obama very long to pick Sonia Sotomayor as his nominee to replace Supreme Court Justice David Souter, but he may face the same difficult choice again soon. With Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and John Paul Stevens likely approaching the end of their tenures, Obama could end up naming at least two more justices to the high court. What would he be looking for in his second and third nominees? Court observers predict he will seek out consensus candidates -- or at least non-provocative ones. In...

There are two ways the Senate can approach a president's judicial nominees, and specifically President Obama's nomination of UC Berkeley law Professor Goodwin Liu to the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco. One: "We had an election, a Democrat won, and the president can pick whom he likes." To wit: Liu - a Rhodes scholar and graduate of Stanford, Oxford and Yale Law School who clerked for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg - is highly qualified. Republicans should not use delay tactics and the filibuster to thwart a full-Senate up-or-down vote on Liu. Two: "Because...

A Supreme Job Opening on Capitol Hill by John F. Di Leo Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens has announced his plans to retire, after some 35 years on the bench. Rather than focusing on the depressing aspects of this news, let’s focus on the bright side, and on the opportunities this will afford our country. The Vote We can take advantage of this news to (again) remind our friends who voted for Barack Obama in 2008 of the importance of their vote in presidential elections. We all know people who were so bored or angered by Senator McCain that...

Even a casual observer of American society can tell that there is a certain sinister chaos spreading throughout every aspect of public life these days. Naturally, as it filters through society it finds its way into our homes, families and personal lives as well. The reports of monumental breakups and takeovers, meltdowns, dysfunctions, cutbacks, disasters, protests, catastrophic events, scandals, and just plain moral chaos are, shall we say, legion, and it does not look like there will be any let up in the dismantling of our formerly decent society any time soon. Public officials and the movers-and-shakers of social...

Conservative radio talk-show host Rush Limbaugh has said many times that elections have consequences. One of the more-far-reaching powers that sitting Presidents hold is the ability to influence the Leftward or Rightward tilt of the entire Republic by the appointments of Justices to the Federal Circuit Courts and to the Supreme Court. This Presidential legacy can span two generations or more, given long lives for particular Judges who are appointed for life and can be removed only through impeachment. President Obama has chosen another leftist, Goodwin Liu (pictured above), from the University of California at Berkeley Law School to sit...

In a story last Sunday the San Francisco Chronicle reported that Proposition 8 judge Vaughn Walker is gay and called his orientation, "The biggest open secret in the landmark trial over same-sex marriage." We have no idea whether the report is true or not. But we do know one really big important fact about Judge Walker: He's been an amazingly biased and one-sided force throughout this trial, far more akin to an activist than a neutral referee. That's no secret at all. Protect Marriage, the defendants in this case, are effectively being held hostage by Judge Walker and cannot really...

By Peter J. Smith SAN FRANCISCO, February 9, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) - In what he describes as “an open secret,” a columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle says that the federal judge presiding over the case against California's Proposition 8 identifies as a homosexual. The revelation now raises questions over whether Chief Justice Vaughn Walker of the U.S. District Court for California's Northern District should recuse himself in the federal trial against Prop. 8, California’s ban on homosexual “marriage.” Chronicle columnists Phillip Matier and Andrew Ross write: “Many gay politicians in San Francisco and lawyers who have had dealings with Walker say...

The lede from an article out Sunday in the SF Chronicle reads as follows: The biggest open secret in the landmark trial over same-sex marriage being heard in San Francisco is that the federal judge who will decide the case, Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker, is himself gay. Interesting. So, what to make of this fact? According to the article, folks aren’t making much of it. Andy Pugno, general counsel for the group that sponsored the Prop. 8 campaign, rebuffed claims that his group might bring it up if Walker ultimately rules against them. “We are not going to...

The biggest open secret in the landmark trial over same-sex marriage being heard in San Francisco is that the federal judge who will decide the case, Chief U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker, is himself gay. Many gay politicians in San Francisco and lawyers who have had dealings with Walker say the 65-year-old jurist, appointed to the bench by President George H.W. Bush in 1989, has never taken pains to disguise - or advertise - his orientation. They also don't believe it will influence how he rules on the case he's now hearing - whether Proposition 8, the 2008 ballot measure...

My personal view would be to remove the filibuster for judicial appointment only. This follows more closely the strict interpretation nof the Constitution and defers to the president to appoint judges as he sees fit. The phrase "elections have consequences" seems to fit here. But the filibuster serves an important role in good government and law making and should not be removed for that.

WASHINGTON — In the wake of the recent Supreme Court ruling that ended most restrictions on corporate funding in elections, a congressional panel was asked Wednesday to enact greater limits on the influence of foreign companies in U.S. elections. At the hearing of a House of Representatives Judiciary subcommittee, experts also sought congressional intervention to restrict contributions from out-of-state corporations. The 5-4 decision last month in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission has sparked debate about the prospect of a possible surge in corporate spending on election campaigns. How to sort out who owns or controls a multinational corporation —...

A British citizen who spent two decades on Ohio's death row before his conviction was overturned was charged with assault after authorities say he smacked his son in the head with a baseball bat. It was the second time since Kenneth Richey's release two years ago that he was accused of assault. Richey, 45, who once came within an hour of being executed, lived in his native Scotland after his release but returned to the U.S. and was living with his ex-wife and their son in Minnesota. He was arrested Jan. 6 after his son, Sean Richey, told police his...

Intimidation of Foreign Workers Now Aimed at Americans: Facebook, Yahoo, Comcast Drawn In Donna Conroy, Director of Bright Future Jobs and John Doe, the administrator of Endh1b.com named in the suit comment on the New Jersey order, Apex Technology Group vs. John Does. Nuisance lawsuits and threats of legal entanglement, long used by Indian H-1b labor contractors to silence Indian tech workers, have now been aimed at an American tech worker website, endh1b.com, for reposting an Indian H-1B worker's testimony of mistreatment by Apex Technology Group, including a link to an employment contract binding the worker to Apex. Bond agreements...

In separate rulings, one in California and the other in Minnesota, judges ordered those states’ governors to restore spending that they had reduced because of soaring deficits. In Minnesota, District Judge Kathleen Gearin directed state Governor Tim Pawlenty (R) to reinstate cuts he had made to a food distribution program, calling the Governor’s actions “callous and immoral.” “At a time of high unemployment it is exceedingly cruel for a state official to be denying people access to the food they need to live,” Gearin said. “This is especially the case when it is obvious that the government has not maximized...

The fallout is already coming from this year's Supreme Court Caperton decision on judicial bias, and it isn't good. A new rule on judicial recusal in Michigan shows how the decision could expose nearly every judge to charges of prejudice. In Caperton v. Massey, the Supremes set out a new standard requiring judges to recuse themselves if there is a "probability of bias" in a case. That was a marked departure from historical standards, which required a judge to step off primarily when he had a direct financial interest. Under the new rule, created by the Michigan Supreme Court to...

A group of judges, political officials and lawyers, led by the retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, has begun a campaign to persuade states to choose judges on the basis of merit, rather than their ability to win an election. As a state legislator in the 1970s, Justice O’Connor helped Arizona create a merit selection system for judges. She is now chairwoman of the O’Connor Judicial Selection Initiative, announced this month by the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System at the University of Denver, to help make judges more than “politicians in robes,” as she has...

Just in time for the holidays, ATRA, or the American Tort Reform Association, as they’ve done the past several years, has announced their list of the year’s Judicial Hellholes. The organization describes the hellholes thusly: Judicial Hellholes are places where judges systematically apply laws and court procedures in an inequitable manner, generally against defendants in civil lawsuits. . . . Not coincidentally, the local or state economies in many of these Hellholes jurisdictions have suffered more than most during the latest recession. And while reasonable people may disagree about the specific rankings assigned to each, no one can reasonably argue...

The stage is being set for a major ruling from the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on the question of whether the United States judiciary actually can enforce the provisions of the U.S. Constitution. The basic question is being raised as an appeal is being assembled to a district judge's decision to dismiss at legal challenge to President Barack Obama's occupancy in the Oval Office based on claims he doesn't even qualify for the position under the requirements of the U.S. Constitution. WND previously reported when U.S. District Judge David Carter decided to dismiss the complaint that listed several...

-- Vote could come as early as MondayHe has been called "extreme" by some. But to others, he's beyond extreme... he's a "Radical's Radical." Whatever he is, he could become President Obama's next choice for the federal judiciary. This radical is Judge David Hamilton, and he's been nominated for a position on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Hamilton has made many political enemies on the right, seeing that his politics are to the far left of the political spectrum. Oh yes, judges aren't supposed to be political, but this one has engaged in quite a bit of leftist activism....

Joan Orie Melvin, a Republican judge from Western Pennsylvania, prevailed in the Philadelphia suburbs yesterday to claim a decisive win in the hard-fought battle for a vacancy on the state Supreme Court. Melvin's victory shifts the political balance on the state's most powerful bench to Republican, and could portend a re-energized conservative base in the 2010 gubernatorial and congressional elections.

A panel concludes its investigation of the 9th Circuit's chief judge after he says he has stopped e-mailing his 'gag list.' No action is taken against him.Alex Kozinski, chief judge of the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, has apologized for having maintained an e-mail "gag list" in which he distributed crude jokes and other humorous material, according to an opinion made public Tuesday. Kozinski was admonished earlier this year in a separate case for being "judicially imprudent" and "exhibiting poor judgment" by placing sexually explicit photos and videos on an Internet server that could be accessed by the public....

Cruel to Be Kind? by: Brittany Fortier, August 27, 2009 One of the more controversial trends in the criminal justice system today is the lobbying effort currently underway to abolish life-without-parole for juvenile offenders. Anti-incarceration activists seek to extend the Supreme Court’s ruling in Roper v. Simmons, which prohibited the death penalty in the cases for juveniles. If they are successful, the “cruel and unusual punishment” analysis used in Roper will be applied to life-without-parole sentences. A panel of legal experts discussed this issue at the Heritage Foundation on August 17, 2009. Paul Wallace, Chief of Appeals at the Delaware...

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran's Supreme Leader appointed Ayatollah Sadeq Larijani as the new head of the country's judiciary on Saturday, state television reported. Some reformist websites had recently reported that Larijani was hesitant to accept the position because of the mass arrests of moderate detainees over unrest that erupted after the country's disputed June 12 presidential election. He will face controversy straight away -- the semi-official ISNA news agency said a new trial would start on Sunday of 25 opposition supporters detained after the election. Larijani, a brother of parliament speaker Ali Larijani and a member of Iran's hardline constitutional...

Federal law now criminalizes activities that the average person would never dream would land him in prison. ---------------------------cut--------------------------- Every year, thousands of upstanding, responsible Americans run afoul of some incomprehensible federal law or regulation and end up serving time in federal prison. What is especially disturbing is that it could happen to anyone at all -- and it has. We should applaud Reps. Bobby Scott (D-Va.) and Louie Gohmert (R-Texas), then, for holding a bipartisan hearing today to examine how federal law can make a criminal out of anyone, for even the most mundane conduct. --------------------------------------cut------------------ This is an inevitable...

Along largely partisan lines, the Senate Judiciary Cmte backed SCOTUS appointee Sonia Sotomayor, Pres. Obama's first high court pick, this morning by a 13-6 vote. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) was the only Republican to support Sotomayor. The Senate cmte's Dems voted unanimously for the Bronx native. The full Senate will vote next, but with the Dems' 60-vote majority, Sotomayor's confirmation is all but a done deal. She will be the first individual of Hispanic heritage to sit on the SCOTUS.

"Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!" -- Emma Lazarus, "The New Colossus" (engraved on pedestal of Statue of Liberty) Foreign litigants suing American companies for torts committed abroad hope the golden door swings open into American courtrooms, even when the conduct and events underlying their claims occurred in far-off lands and have no effect on U.S. citizens. With increased frequency, American companies conducting operations abroad face lawsuits in American courts by...